Vacation
by MissBonhamCartersPoppet
Summary: Elphaba feels a sudden bout of homesickness, and Glinda has some bad news. Gelphie friendship.


A/N: Disclaimed. I wrote this as Gelphie friendship (gasp), but read into it what you will.

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It was the last school day before Shiz vacation, and all around Elphaba spotted students packing, saying goodbyes, making excuses to teachers and handing over dorm-keys for the holidays. Elphaba watched all this from the window beside her bed, a book balanced comfortably on her angular knees and a marker held loosely between her fingers. She felt she had a right to daydream- a whole term of studying and hard work had come to an end, results were out and, predictably, Elphaba had topped the honour roll. No, for once Elphaba wasn't worrying about an assignment or paying attention to her never-ending supply of books. In fact, her mind couldn't have been further away, nestled in the carriage Frex, Nessa and herself had shared as nomads in Quadling Country. She watched every other student prepare for their home-goings, nonchalant about seeing their families again.

"Oh, I _do_ wish I were able to spend the break with all of you," she heard a faceless girl proclaim to another beneath her window sill, "but I'm expected home for Lurlinemas. Family gatherings never seem to grow old, apparently." Elphaba gave the ghost of a smile. She could almost hear the girl rolling her eyes.

Odd though it seemed even to herself, homesickness caught Elphaba firmly in the throat, constricting it. She looked around at Glinda, who had been packing her bags with an uncharacteristic quiet that Elphaba had been loath to interrupt. Though, since her transformation after the death (_murder_, Elphaba reminded herself sharply, a bubble of anger inflating suddenly within her abdomen) of Doctor Dillamond there had been many more silences from the blonde girl. She and Elphaba had grown closer as well, closeness Elphaba was wary and skittish about, for reasons she couldn't define. But as they'd suffered over the loss of an Ama and the death of a teacher, a friendship had blossomed between the two, a friendship that may have made Elphaba's imprisonment on campus bearable- but Glinda, like all her rich, well-loved friends, was going home for vacation.

"Glinda, do you think it's possible to feel homesick if you've never had a home?" she asked, book-marking the same page she'd begun on when opening the book, some half hour earlier.

Glinda folded a skirt neatly into the corner of her trunk, smoothing the silken fabric. "Homesickness isn't a about missing a place, Elphie. It's the people. Home is wherever the people you love are. When you're away from them, you're away from home. Hence the homesickness."

She talked with her back turned, but Elphaba didn't miss the tiny sniffle that had snuck out during her words. If Elphaba shifted slightly to the left, like so, and the light caught Glinda's face, she could see a line of tears sliding down her roommate's cheek. Elphaba swallowed and wondered what she ought to do. For all her cleverness when it came to book-learning, comforting had never been something taught in a seminar. Glinda may have been Elphaba's closest (and arguably only) friend, but she knew little of how to deal with her emotions.

"Is everything alright, Glinda?" she started, hating the upright and formal turn her tone had taken.

"Quite." The blonde replied, wiping her eyes with a piece of cloth. She finally turned to Elphaba, blinking rapidly. "I suppose I ought to tell you, Elphie, that this may be the last time I attend Shiz."

Elphaba furrowed her brown, stunned by Glinda's sudden statement. "Why?" she asked, fighting to keep her voice even. There was a turmoil of unexpected emotions brewing inside her, pain that made Elphaba wish instead for the mere dull thud of homesickness.

"Popsicle," she began, breathing deeply, "My father, I mean. He's been charged with fraud." Elphaba's eyebrows rose, but she remained unreadable. "Apparently there has been some sort of embezzlement scandal at Popsicle's... My _father's_ firm. And they... Believe he is responsible. If they prove… If they find a way to blame… Well, he'll be sent to Southstairs."

Her voice cracked awkwardly on the last note, raising the pitch to painful proportions. Suddenly she smiled a heartbreaking smile and dabbed her eyes hastily. "Of course, it's all a terrible mistake. You know businessmen, always looking for someone to blame. Popsicle would never…"

She left the unfinished sentence hanging in the air above them, weighing down apon their shoulders. Elphaba wondered who Glinda spoke to convince. A tenderness that shocked them both overtook Elphaba as she stood- a full foot taller than her pixie-like roommate- and folded a now crying Glinda into her arms. They had never so much as brushed hands before, so was the twitchy nature of Elphaba, yet this closeness, this almost moulding of two people into one, felt comfortable and familiar. She didn't even mind the faint sting of Glinda's tears seeping through the material of her frock. She smoothed Glinda's hair off her face, and was reminded strongly of watching her mother, all those years ago, holding Nessa on her lap when the younger Thropp had woken from a nightmare.

"Hush…" she whispered delicately, worried by the frailness and sheer breakability of the girl in her arms. "You know your father-"

"Popsicle." Glinda mumbled through her stream of tears.

"Popsicle." Elphaba corrected, knowing better than to smirk. "You know your Popsicle much better than any of those lawyers trying to accuse him, don't you?"

Glinda nodded slowly, her lip trembling.

"Then if you say he's innocent, I believe you." She smiled encouragingly and eased the blonde, so quickly reverted to childhood by her tearful sniffling, away from her chest.

"And anyway, you have to come back. How would I ever survive without distraction from the Awful Ms. Pfanee and Co.?"

Glinda gave a watery smile. "You're right, Elphie. You're always right." She squeezed Elphaba's midrift once more then returned, sniffing, to her packing.

Elphaba walked back to her bed and the cool window, watching the students below with a new eye. Perhaps, when it came down to it, family was more trouble than it was worth. She sighed, opened her book once again, and felt a small hand on her elbow.

"Just in case… This is the last time." Glinda kissed Elphaba softly of the cheek. As she watched her roommate's pale yellow embroided back retreat through the door, luggage in tow, Elphaba raised her fingers gingerly to the patch of skin Glinda's lips had touched and brought them down with an air of amazement.

"I'll still be here," she promised to Glinda's unhearing figure, "When you come back."

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R&R please, it's always useful.


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